1. How do elderly individuals living independently describe their experience of Loneliness?
2. How do elderly individuals living independently interpret their experience of loneliness?

Saturday, August 23, 2008

"Loneliness is just the feeling of incompleteness..."

She selects a strong tree as a metaphor. She admits that the strongs tree symbolizes the fact that although she is aging, she is still standing and also that her way of life is like that of a strong tree as well. She is an 89-year-old retired English teacher. She describes and interprets loneliness as, "it is just the feeling of incompleteness and a feeling of missing a significant other." Besides experiencing the feeling of incompleteness due to the missing of her significant other, she also admits sadness does exist in her life. She explains, "Sadness surfaces once awhile."